A Hoad off my mind with KM Group reporter Alex Hoad - Putting the Premier League TV rights deal to rights and taking on The Jump
Published: 00:00, 12 February 2015
Updated: 09:30, 12 February 2015
Now I like watching football on the telly as much as anyone.
Come home from work, find the missus watching something God-awful on E4 or ITV2 or some other pedlar of drivel and pop a game on the laptop, or iPad or something. What a lovely way to spend an evening.
I’d say I probably watch at least three or four games a week, most weeks. If the other half is away for any reason, then you can increase that number to nine or 10.
Seems as though my days of watching football on the box are nearly up after the Premier League TV rights for 2016 to 2019 were sold on Tuesday for £5.136 billion.
That is a big number. Most places you’ll see the figure given as £5.1bn. That rounds down by £36m. Thirty. Six. Million. Pounds.
The sum – driven higher by interest from overseas broadcasters – is an increase of 71% on the previous rights deal and means each televised game between 2016 and 2019 will cost broadcasters more than £10m to screen.
The result means that the ‘prize-money’ for finishing bottom of the Premier League in 2016/17 will be £99m – that could rise further depending on things like TV appearances.
Now the inevitable result of this much-needed and long-awaited influx of money into the game will be to reduce ticket prices for supporters, right? Right?
This week I’ve parted hands with £54.50 for a restricted view ticket in the away end at QPR in a couple of weeks’ time. Even now, I’m not quite sure why I did it.
Having been to Loftus Road in the past, I know that the physical seat itself is worth less than a quid and the legroom, view and overall experience is akin to being in steerage on a trans-Atlantic crossing in 1856.
I can totally envisage a world, and in the not too distant future, where you’ve got £100m players running around, doing the bare minimum to earn their half-a-million a week wages, in front of tens of thousands of corporates, tourists and day-trippers, with the broadcasters having to ‘pipe in’ atmospheric crowd sounds to those at home who can afford their increased subscription fees, needed to cover the payment for the TV rights.
Make no mistake, this is an absolute disaster waiting to happen.
My solution? Halve ticket prices so people who can’t afford their TV subscriptions have something else to do with their money.
*
I can’t quite get my head around something. The Jump.
Now I suppose it’s good that winter sports are being brought to the attention of a wider audience.
However, in what world is it right that the result of the Channel 4 reality show, featuring some of the nation’s foremost non-entities, should get more attention and column inches than... the results of winter sports events contested by actual winter sports athletes around the world at the same time.
As mightily impressive as Joey Essex’s 17.5m ski-jump was, to pip Mike Tindall by a mere 50cm, surely we should be using that air-time to celebrate the achievements of Kent’s own European skeleton champion Lizzy Yarnold or talented partially-sighted skier Millie Knight, rather than giving these TV ‘personalities’ their sixth minute of fame and additional oxygen of publicity.
Read more
Sports ColumnsMore by this author
Alex Hoad